The Long Road to Recovery: Community Responses to Industrial Disaster (UNU, 1996, 307 pages)

2 Responses to Minamata disease

(introductory text...)

Introduction

Who are the victims of Minamata disease?

Official recognition of Minamata disease and the initial response

Chisso's grip on the local community

Neglect in preventing the spread of disease

Problems associated with relief and reparations

How the local community suppressed the victims

Conclusions

Editor's postscript

Chronology

Notes

References

How the local community suppressed the victims

The vitality of the local community in Minamata was slowly sapped
by repeated failures to arrive at a solution to the problems of Minamata
disease. However, it was also the local citizens who helped to drag out the
process of settlement. Chisso held the reins of political power in Minamata but,
in disputes with people affected by Mina mate disease, they could count on local
residents to come to their aid. Workers from Chisso and affiliated companies
turned their backs on the victims because they believed that their own
livelihoods were threatened by any assault on the corporation. With a majority
of the citizens behind them, Chisso commanded public officials and other local
influentials. As a longestablished local institution, the company took advantage
of their ties geographical, economic, and familial to the area and were able to
suppress victims' appeals. Though their claims for reparations were relatively
modest, protesters were effectively penned into an isolated group. For example,
when fishermen protested to Chisso in 1959, the Mayor and Chairman of Minamata
City Council headed a delegation of 28 groups that lobbied the Governor against
stopping industrial discharges from Chisso because that action "signed certain
death for the local community." They followed this up with a request for the
prefecture to provide "ample defense against acts of violence" and implored the
Ministry of Health and Welfare to ignore arguments that might implicate Chisso
as a cause of the disaster.

Although victims' protests grew throughout the 1960s into a fully
fledged social movement - complete with support from external interest groups
Chisso's appeal to the existence of a "shared destiny" between the citizens and
the company was a formidable obstacle. Even as late as 1968, when official
recognition of the causes of Minamata disease had been secured, Chisso was able
to bring together more than 2,500 persons representing 53 local groups in
support of a concerted effort to rebuild the Chisso Minamata plant. At this
time, the President of Chisso attempted to dampen the exultation of victims
about the progress they were making in seeking commitments from the corporation
by making a statement that "plant reconstruction depended on whether cooperation
could be won from labor unions and the local community."

Again, in 1971, when local groups were battling in direct
negotiations for reparation, the Mayor of Minamata pronounced that he "would
defend Chisso even in the eyes of national consensus." (He later explained that
he was forced to make this statement "for the sake of creating and maintaining
jobs for the people.") Yet again, in 1975, Minamata City Council officially
requested both the state and the prefecture to mitigate Chisso's burden of work
for the removal of contaminated sludge from Minamata Bay. And once more, in
1977, an organization created and funded by the City Council campaigned to
collect signatures in support of reconstruction of the Chisso plant.

In short, the carefully cultivated myth of "shared destiny"
between city and company had taken deep root in the community. Opponents of
"mutuality" were discriminated against and suppressed. The victims - not the
disease - were now seen as the threat. They also became scapegoats for the
community's problems. In this curious and troubling inversion of reality,
Minamata disease itself became a taboo subject.

If something truly effective is to be done about the lingering
impact of Minamata disease, a start must be made on fashioning a new concept of
the community. The conception of "shared destiny" that served the interests of
Chisso and many of its workers in earlier decades must be dismantled. It will be
necessary to free the residents of Minamata from dependence on a single
corporation and to diversify the economic foundations of the community. So far,
existing approaches have not produced a solution to the ills that still blight
the lives and landscape in Minamata. This alternative remains to be
tried.